Pathology

The full-length studio debut from the Northern California-based, self-described "bossa nova dream pop" quartet, Pathology is a sonically lighthearted, windows down, summer road trip of a record that tosses Spanish flamenco, contemporary R&B, Música Popular Brasileira, and sunny electronic indie pop into a blender, gives it a couple of pulses, and serves it all up in a vintage chilled Tiki glass pool side. The follow-up to the Trails and Ways' promising 2012 EP Trilingual (the group sings in English, Spanish, and Portuguese), the Barsuk-issued Pathology is sort of an all-purpose summer album, offering an elegant mix of unfussy, midtempo club jams ("Say You Will," "Jacaranda," "Skeletons"), driving electro-pop ("Mtn Tune"), and lazy, late afternoon siesta enablers ("Terezinha," "Vines"), all of which are delivered with the easy gait and disaffected cool of a gang of seasoned world travelers with a shared love for Disclosure, Sade, Passion Pit, and Astrud Gilberto. ~ James Christopher Monger